Partisan Shot
by perigee
Summary: The new year brings a new DADA teach after the mysterious disspearance of their last, attacks inside the "safest place in britain", more political manouvering by who should be to young for that stuff and nobody did ever figure out what the deal was with that forbidden third floor corridor of last year.
1. A Room of Activity

**Chapter 1 - A Room of Activity**

Thousands of candles floated lazily above the four large tables as the students excitedly poured into the large hall for the first time this year. Hundreds of students, all loudly talking about the exciting things they had done over the last two summer months, speculating over the upcoming school year and guessing who the new defence teacher would be this year. All together they made an impressive amount of noise that only really a school full of children could make. But the candles floating above their heads didn't to much attention to any of that, just like they didn't seem pay attention to other minor things like the laws of gravity and thermodynamics. They just floated on above the the increasingly louds room while not having a care in the world.

One of the older persons in the room, a teacher sitting at the raised table at the back of the hall, didn't have as much luck in ignoring the noise made by the large amount of children who had just entered the hall and ruined any chance of him enjoying the cup of tea he was drinking. With a small sigh, inaudible over the noise in the room, he sat down his cup and looked at the sea of children being too stuck up in their own little insignificant lives to be able to make their way over to their respective house tables in a somewhat orderly fashion. September first was always a day he looked forward to with much dread and for not the first time he wondered how he had ever let that old fool task him into taking up a teaching position. Teaching. Teaching children. He. How ridiculous, those good for nothing brats didn't even know the top side of a cauldron from the bottom, let alone the subtle usages of crystallized cudweed. The only thing those walking potion accidents managed to create consistently were molten cauldrons and acid burns.

Not wanting to think about the classes what would be starting next day he looked over to his students who were slowly starting to take seat at the leftmost table, ignoring the excited speculation some of his colleagues were making about their changes to take the quidditch cup this year. The members of his house had at least managed to carry themselves somewhat more dignified than the other houses. His eyes rested briefly on a somewhat small raven haired boy before quickly moving on. Oh what a joy he had turned out the be last year. What a joke. Harry Bloody Potter being sorted into Slytherin, no one had seen that one coming and he had wondered for weeks what in the name of morgana's ass that old, moldy, arrogant piece of cloth was thinking when he dumped the bloody boy into his figurative hands. After the first few weeks that year he was sure the whole world was just out to get him. The boy didn't have an ambitious bone in his body, the old demented man hadn't said anything that anybody sane would be able to understand and the first years seemed even worse as potions as the ones before them. However impossible that should have been.

The boy in question was ignorant about the internal rant his head of house was currently going through, he was quietly talking with the boy next to him about their upcoming classes while some of his year mates were discussing the latest advancements in racing brooms and whether the new Cleansweep would finally be able to surpass the advancements Nimbus had been able to make in the last years. The boy didn't have too many friends and didn't talk much with most of the yearmates in his house. He had learned the hard way last year about how to behave himself in his house and the politics that played in all years within the walls of the common room. By now he had been able to make a few friends and had been able to come to somewhat decent terms with the rest of his year. Slytherins naturally didn't hold many social contacts outside of their house but he had at least found a single Ravenclaw girl he could team up with during charms and sometimes study together with in the library.

Listening to one of his friends as he described the trip to Italy he had made over the summer the boy took a look over at the head table. The old headmaster was discussing something with the stern librarian, although he seemed more into the conversation than she was. The short charms master was weaving his arms around excitedly at the chubby herbology professor, probably being far too busy talking about the latest discoveries in the area of teaspoon animations to notice the cup he was knocking over. His head of house and potions professor was sneering at the occupants of the hall with a particular sense of disgust that seemed to be reserved for only start of term fests. At the end of the table sat a middle aged man with an out of place bright cloak and a smile on his face that made him look overly happy with himself.

By simple process of elimination it could be concluded that it was the new defence against the dark arts professor, his previous one having disappeared under unknown circumstances at the end of his last year.

Leaning over to his friend who had just finished a story about the incredibly interesting magical ruins he visited in southern Italy he asked if he knew who the new professor was.

"Oh he, yeah I've heard of him before, my mom seems obsessed over him for some reason, Gilderoy Lockhart."

 _Lockhart_ he had seen that name before, on the overly long list of DADA books he had to purchase for the coming school year. A teacher whose only required reading material were books he had written himself was either more interested with the galleons in his pocket than the the quality of his lessons. Or someone who believed the opinions of his colleagues in the field to be insignificant compared to the knowledge he had to offer. Either way he couldn't be much worse than the stuttering heap of garlic they had last year.

The boy's thought were broken by the doors great halls opening once again and a single line of eleven year olds entered the room in a much more orderly fashion then the older students had done. The reason that they entered the room in an organized single line instead of "opening of the floodgates" method the older years prefered didn't come down to them being better mannered or anything like that. No the new students moved mostly as calm as they were because the vast majority of them seemed to be hugely intimidated by the great hall and the students inside of it, most which were currently scrutinizing the young children. Some of the first years were looking outright terrified to be there and seemed more ready to take on a full grown dragon than do their sorting. There were always some exceptions to be found each year though, one small blonde boy seemed to be excited more than anything the be here, and was probably going to end up with neck cramps from the way he kept looking around. A girl with dirty blond hair near the end of the line had a way of walking that could best be described as "floating", although here feet were definitely touching the ground and a girl with curly hair seemed to be to busy looking the hufflepuff table, probably looking for her older brother or sister to note that she was holding up the line being her.

As the line headed by the transfiguration professor reached the foot of the raised platform that held the head table McGonagall put, the same old unbalanced stool that was used last year, on the platform and placed the the Sorting Hat on top of it, after sitting on the stool for just over a minute in a seemingly arrogant manner that only a thousand year old piece of cloth could manage, it opened it mouth and started singing a song of some sort that it had probably spend the majority of the last year coming up with.

Harry took another look at the students who would be joining the population in the castle for the next seven year and wondered if children were getting smaller every year or if he had _really_ been that tiny just twelve months ago.

The song itself wasn't to much to be written home of, the same old story about house values, inter house unity and various other things that were so far disconnected from the reality of life at Hogwarts that Harry wondered if the old hat had ever bothered to actually take note about the happenings around it since the discovery of America. Still he applauded politely together with the rest of the older students, the first years being either to confused or scared to do so.

Once the sorting had started Harry tuned out from most of the things that happened together with the majority of the student population as Blaise continued his story about his travels through continental Europe, only pausing his story for the customary applause when their house got a new member.

Once the final first year, an obvious Weasley going by the red hair, had joined the rest of her family at the table on the far side of the room, being loudly welcomed by three of the male red heads while a fourth red head just looked annoyed at the behaviour of his siblings, the headmaster rose to do his annual and mostly futile attempt at impressing the young minds in front of him.

"Welcome", he began, "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts, before you all begin your best attempt at finishing the large amount of food that is prepared for this occasion every year I have a few general announcements to make and a few more personal words I would like to share with you."

"First of all, the forrest just of the school grounds didn't have it's name changed over the summer and is, as usual, forbidden"

"Secondly, Mr. Filch has asked me to once again remind all of you that the, increasingly lengthy, list of forbidden items can be found on the door to his office and that all students planning to purchase anything, either through owl order, or during the Hogsmeade weekends should make sure to check the list beforehand."

"And thirdly, it is my please to announce to you our new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. Gilderoy Lockhart."

Dumbledore applauded politely, a gesture followed by the other staff members and a minority of the students while the new teacher in question gave an, obviously practiced smile and waved slightly to the children sitting before him.

"With that out of the way I'm sure you're all desperate to begin on the banquet and continue catching up with your friends. But before that, I would like to say a few words. Fish! Sidewalk! Window! Pond!"

 _About as usefull as the speech last year,_ Harry thought as the headmaster sat back in his chair as the table in front of him were filled to the brim with a decent variety of food in an instant.

During the meal Blaise was as usual much too preoccupied with the plate in front of him to pay any attention to his friends so Harry resorted to having a discussion with the sole female member of his small group of friends about the curriculum for the upcoming year and the chances of the new DADA professor possessing any knowledge about the subject he is supposed to be teaching.

After the hall full of students had once again failed the challenge set to them by the elves down in the kitchen the students starting making their way out of the hall and towards their respective common hall. As Harry stood up he heard the new fifth year perfect call his new housemates with a lot more enthusiasm as, the now sixth year, prefect had managed last year. He let the skinny boy pass and made his way to the dungeons with his friends walking at a small distance behind the third year students that had been sitting to his left during the meal. Making his way through the, currently opened, stone arch that gave access to the well decorated Slytherin common hall he made his way over to the hallway leading to the second year dormitories.

Harry didn't feel like watching about a dozen intimidated or scared eleven year olds being introduced to the rules they would have to follow for the next seven years and was tired in a way that you could only get from sitting still for the entire day. That he just entered his room, did the usual short evening ritual of personal hygiene before grabbing one of his study books from his trunk and going to bed.

He would read through the book, "Transient Transfigurations - Vol. II" in this case, for an hour or so before going to sleep as he usually did during his months in Hogwarts.

Harry had spent a significant portion of his time in the latter parts of the year studying for his classes and practicing various forms of magic. After all if you didn't want to be at the bottom of the hierarchy in Slytherin, you needed some way to show that you were better than the others. And having a greater magical skill than your peers was one of the easier ways for him to do such a thing if one didn't already come from a long line of "better than others".

His friend had suggested that he probably had a fortune sitting around somewhere in a vault, something which would come handy while navigating the social ladder of Slytherin. But the goblins had refused do as much as even confirm or deny the mere existence of any further potter vaults before he was fifteen or had express written permission from his guardians which removed any opportunities in that field for the foreseeable future.

While the large amount of fame that came with being The-Boy-Who-Lived would at least assure him a minimum level of social standing, since nobody wanted to truly antagonize anyone who might end up holding a significant amount of power in the future and most "proper" Slytherins were not above setting aside something as minor as personal believes if there was a personal gain to be made. The specific methods he had used to achieve his fame still wasn't to appreciated by a significant portion of his audience. While few people would make any outright statement of the sort, it was clear that not every member of his house appreciated the actions of his one year old self.


	2. A Room of Peace

**Chapter 2 - A Room of Peace**

The first day of classes were always one of the most peaceful days in the Hogwarts library, the row after row of books sat undisturbed on their high shelves, all properly sorted by subject and year with their thick covers neatly aligned to form an impressive looking wall of books. Overall the amount of work that has done over the student-free summer months by the libertarian was easily visible and the pride she took from the state of her domain obvious.

Only a handful of people were inside the library today, most students still being too much used to their long summer holidays to think about such things as homework or writing assignments. A timid young boy sat next to a window near the back of the room going through a thick tomb, potions of some sorts if judging by the images on the large green cover. A girl browsing the Charms section closer the door got noticed by the raven haired boy entering the library looking for something that would provide better explanation about a transfiguration concept that the book he was currently reading had only hinted at shortly.

"Granger." the boy greeted.

"Potter." She responded. "I hope you had a nice summer."

"About as well as I could have hoped. But obviously not as sunny as your's." Hinting at the darker than usual skin of the girl.

"Probably yes, I spend the last three weeks of it in France with my parents, it was great and I even visited the main magical district in Paris for a day. So what has gotten your interest to have you here after the first day of classes, I don't think any teacher has assigned any reports yet."

"Looking for something about 'Litzher's Principle of least transfiguration', the book noted its significance in lower level transfigurations but failed to give any further information about it."

The girl pondered about it for a moment, the two of them had grown into an interesting relationship over the last year. Not necessarily one that one could describe as friends, associates was probably a better description. Both of them starting their time at the magical school without any knowledge about the world they suddenly found themselves in and both resorting to books as solution for this problem. They could be seen reading together in the library at a fairly regularly, exchanging only a small number of words between the two as they focused on the paper in front of them. And they often teamed up in the few classes the Slytherins and Ravenclaws shared.

"Yes, I do recall the book mentioning that, I believe there was a little bit more about it near the end but nothing of much significance. The author seems mainly focused on providing the minimum amount of information that still gives a sufficient explanation for the spell it covers but doesn't spend much time providing any deeper understanding about the magic. Which is a shame because even the very basic magic we use in the first years at school can be improved so much if have proper understanding of the underlying principles."

Harry had heard her tell the same story in a few different variant multiple times over the last year but let her talk anyway. He found the girl easy to get along with as long as you were able to ignore her constant desire to teach the ones around here from time to time. He moved over to the transfiguration isle just a bit over and skimmed the titles for anything relevant, finding a book titled "Investigating the Seventeen Core Principals of Inanimate Transfigurations and Their Interactions". Browsing through the book it looked a bit too advanced for him but he hoped to at least be able to get a decent understanding from the lengthy chapter it had on Litzher's.

Saying a short goodby to his female acquaintance he checked out the book and started walking back towards his common room.

The door to the Slytherin common was hidden behind a nondescript wall in the upper parts of the dungeon, when provided with the weekly changing password the large stone bricks of the wall would slide inwards majestically and provide access to the green and silver decorated common room. The room was spacious, providing plenty of space for seven year worth of students all doing their own thing without getting into each other ways. In the back of the room were a series of large windows looking out into the more shallow parts of the lake. Being underwater they didn't provide too much light but the way the little light they did let through shine through the clear, rimply, water gave a nice relaxed atmosphere to the room. The lack of direct sunlight was remedied by the three large fireplaces on the left side of the room and a series of torches and gas lamps spread around the room which raised the light level in the room to a comfortable level for reading. A series of couches, positioned around the three fireplaces, which also provided the majority of the heating for the room, were widely regarded as the most comfortable sport in the common room and thus usually reserved for the upper years or the odd fifth year who had managed to make his way up the social ladder.

Harry moved over to the series of tables accompanying the various bookshelves that lined the east side of the room. These were the usual spot for the younger students, with the lowest years sitting closest to the entrance. Even though these weren't the prime Slytherin real estate they were still comfortable enough with a good variation of simple wooden chairs at the tables and soft, more comfortable chairs for some lazy reading or simply hanging around.

Arriving at the group of second year students he took an empty seed between his two friends and Nott, who was about halfway through a thick, tome with a nondescript cover.

"And where have you been running of to?" Tracy said with a playful smile.

"Probably the library again, you know he loves books more than he loves us." Blaise responded with a grin on his face.

"Oh shut it you two, I was just there for a bit to lookup a small thing."

"Oh Blaise. We have always been so kind to him but he pays more attention to bundles of paper than to his supposed friends. Where did we go wrong". Tracy continued, ignoring Harry's response.

"He is lost to us, the first day of school and he's already spending the entire day between the shelves. All hope is lost."

Harry hit Blaise in the shoulder and the boy let out a short laugh.

"Well, I can't help it that you two wouldn't touch a book if your life depended on it. Anyway we're starting tomorrow with a double block of DADA, who do you think Lockhart will be." Harry asked.

"I'm not sure, my mom seems very impressed with him and that's high praise for anyone. I've also read some of his books that were on the list and while they are definitely an interesting read, I'm not sure what they are supposed to teach us."

The next morning the second year Slytherin and Gryffindor students, whoever still thought that putting those together in a small room was not known to anyone, anxiously entered the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom and took their seating, all curious to know if their teacher this year had any competence in the subject. Just over a minute after all students had taken their seats, both houses completely split from each other as usual. The door in the front of the room opened and their teacher entered the room, carrying a large cage of some sorts covered with a thick, dark red cloak.

He sat the cage down on his desk, the weight of the object visible through his movements and smiled at the class in front of him.

"Hello everyone!" He began enthusiastically. "And welcome to your second year of Defence Against the Dark Arts classes, now I understand that switching teachers after only one year can have a negative effect on the course and my predecessor hasn't been forward thinking enough to leave lesson notes for any successor in cause he would suddenly disappear from the surface of the earth without leaving a single trace. But I can assure you that your OWL grades are secure and that your education will not suffer from the sudden change."

"Now, to start things of interesting and to allow me to get an idea of the level all of you are one, we will start this lesson with a little..." He lingered for a little bit, walking to the edge of his desk.

"Exam!" he finished, as the ripped the cloak from the cage, exposing a large amount of angry looking pixies to the class of unsuspecting second years, and quickly made his way back to his office, closing the door behind him firmly.

Chaos ensued as the large amount of pixies, agitated by the sudden increase in light, rushed out the cage they were in and started flying through the classroom.

Students started screaming, caused by the completely unexpected situation the students suddenly found themselves in. Some Some tried to, mostly unsuccessfully, hit or spell the little beast out of the the air that were assaulting them or hid under the desks. Children were running around screaming and more than one lost their wands in the utter chaos. People running towards the door while trying to dodge an onslaught of little critters rushing towards them only to discover that the door was locked and suddenly found themselves out in the open, in a corner with no place to escape to.

Some of the more studious students managed to hold them off a collection of defensive spell with varying levels of success and Harry had decent luck holding them off with a low-level variant of the shield spell, by no means sufficient for any sort of dual but it was effective at stopping light physical objects and significantly easier to cast than the complicated, proper, shield charm. Making it suitable to use for younger students. Blaise, who had been sitting next to him did an admirable job of keeping the little creatures away using one of their DADA books as weapon and using Harry as cover for his back.

After the pixies had been roaming around the room for a full few minutes a clear " **Peskipiksi Pesternomi** " could be heard and every single one of the little winged creatures froze and fell to the floor. A few basic spell later and they were all back in the cage, once again covered by the cloak and the classroom slowly came back to rest.

"Well, that was certainly an informative experience" Lockhart said with a smile, seemingly unfazed by the state of his classroom.

"Now if you could all make sure you have all of your belongings and make your way back to year desk we can have a look at the result of this little experiment."

"Now before I go over how all you performed I would like to know if any of you has been able to deduce the meaning behind the activity." He looked around the room for an answer although most people still seemed to be too shocked to fully understand what he was saying, after a while a hand rose slowly a few seats to the left of Harry.

"Yes, Mr. Nott." the teacher called out.

"It was meant to see who we would react to danger in an unexpected situation." the boy answered.

"Very good, very good. Yes, this was a test to see how each of you would respond to a situation of unexpected danger. None of you were expecting to be in any danger during the first class of the year and none of you are likely to have any experience in handling pixies, especially larger groups of them.

Now, while the spell I used to subdue the swarm was in fact mentioned briefly in one of the books that were prescribed for this course I didn't expect any of you to have remembered that specific spell or have even read that specific book.

No, the most important thing I've learned from all my travels is that you can never be prepared for every situation you might run into. And that the most important skill to have is not knowing as many spells as possible or being able to cast those spells with the greatest amount of power behind them. The most important skill you can have for surviving a dangerous situation is quick thinking and the ability to improvise." Lockhart concluded.

"Now, some of you tried to exit the room and get away from the danger, a very good option in most situations but you failed to keep a backup option in mind and found yourself in a corner when your first plan failed."

"Some of you went for a more offensive approach but as you likely found out, the general spell repertoire of a second year is not sufficient to handle a larger number of pixies. As much as you can say that offence is the best defence, you'll find that an offensive solution usually requires a much greater deal of knowledge and/or power than the alternatives."

"Those of you who managed to keep up a sufficient defence through magical means, I applaud your quick thinking and clever applications of your limited spell knowledge but please try to be aware of the limitations of your magical defence. It might have been sufficient in this case but there are many cases where you will find yourself overwhelmed if you just rely on your magic to defend you."

"The people who sought the cover and safety of their desk are probably the people who picked the best option. While hiding might not bring you much glory, it doesn't require any specific knowledge or magical skill, won't drain your physical or magical reserves and isn't likely to place you in an even worse position than you started at."

And for the people who's only response to the situation was to start panicking and screaming. I will just say that you should be grateful if we're only some pixies this time."

After a few moments to led the words sink in he continued.

"Now, this also ties in with the question I'm sure many of you would have. What kind of teacher would put seven of his own books, that aren't even educational material, on the required book list."

"The main way to improve your ability to think on your feet and allow you to quickly improvise in a dangerous situation is to have a lot of experience in handling dangerous situations. While no two situations are the same you can often use your experience from one in a related scenario."

"And since I didn't think your parents would be happy with a six month trip around Romania looking for vampires to get some first hand experience, you'll have to do with the the next best thing. Second hand experience."

"While it would be unlikely for many of you to run in the similar situations as I have been in over the years, I believe that the experiences in then can give you valuable experience about handling an as large variety of situations as possible."


	3. A Room of Planning

**Chapter 3 - A Room of Planning**

The headmaster's office was dimly lit as the last rays of sunshine for the day peaked over the forest, the room was filled with strange looking objects of various sizes and every piece of wall was filled with either a painting of some sort of hidden behind a shelf. No order was apparent in the chaos, in a bookshelf on the west wall stood a single book, slightly to the left of the center of the top shelf while the the rest of the bookshelf was filled with twenty seven statues of penguins, all slightly different than the other. All of the statues were aligned perfectly on their shelves except for a single on on the bottom shelf who was balanced on it's head. Next to the door hang a small painting of either rolling grassy hills or a wild river flowing through a dense forest, the painting itself also seemed unsure about it. The single window outside gave a view of the Hogwarts grounds which, if you were familiar with how the caste looked from the outside, didn't seem to correspond with any physical location in the caste.

On top of a small stand in the corner sat a large bird with crimson red and gold feathers. The creature was staring intensely at a device which stood on one of the shelves next to him, the device consisted of a set of six small metal balls suspended by wires in a small frame, the two outer balls took turns bouncing upwards and make a soft, rhythmic ticking sound. The bird was following the small balls with his eyes and his head bobbed with the rhythm of the balls bouncing up and down. The staring contest between the inanimate object and the bird looked like it had been going on for a while by now and no winner was in sight.

On the corner of the desk stood an antique looking clock which hands permanently pointed to a quarter to five, although it did make the rhythmic ticking noise that suggested it was still running.

The desk the clock stood on looked distinctly normal, completely out of place in the room that had a small toll spinning on the side of one of the paintings, constantly emitting a high buzzing noise. So normal in fact that anyone who saw it expected it to hold a great secret of some sort.

Behind the desk on, a large comfy chair sat the current resident of the office in deep thought.

The thing Albus was thinking about was the problem of his Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, not the current one mind you. Albus was pleasantly surprised about what he had heard from the first set of lessons the new teacher had given, however unusual his teaching methods had been. No, the teacher that Albus had been spending a great amount of time thinking about over the past months had been the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher of last year.

Quirrel had only the slightest competence in the field he was teaching and wholly unsuccessful in transferring any of that competence to his pupils, and despite all that he had still been one of the better DADA teacher in the last five years. Albus was once again glad that the quality of the standard DADA books seemed to be the complete opposite of the teacher using them, making it possible against all odds for students to get a decent grade in their OWLs and NEWTs.

But the reason the old headmaster was deep in thought about last year's DADA teacher was not his teaching skills, or lack thereof, but the reason why he wasn't still teaching the subject this year.

Now it was far from uncommon for a Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher to leave for one reason or the other after a single year of teaching, in fact Albus couldn't remember a single case in over forty years where a teacher had lasted longer than a single year. The uncommon thing about it was the way the teacher had left, usually they quit due to significant mental damage of some sorts, had to stay in Saint Mungo's spell damage wards for an extended period of time or at least a body was found near the end of the year.

But last year none of those things had happened, one day the teacher was attempting, without much success, to explain the difference between the various types of manifolds to a class of fifth years and the next day the teacher had vanished from the castle without a trace. There was no message or anything left, nothing was seen by the elves, ghosts or paintings, there wasn't even any trace of him recorded by the wards. It was as if he had disappeared from the earth from one moment to the other, leaving behind only his belongings and a stack of half graded third year papers.

A single mysterious disappearance within the castle alone wouldn't be enough to keep Albus awake at night, something like that wasn't completely unheard of in the history of Hogwarts. The most notable occurrence being in the winter of 1674, where the entire male population of Hufflepuff disappeared without a trace. The main reason behind the headmaster's worry was that his disappearance coincided with the disappearance of a certain stone that was stored in the castle.

He had only noticed a few days later during his weekly check up on the stone and his defences that Albus had noticed that the stone was no longer in the mirror, and while there was no direct proof linking the two disappearances, Albus had learned years ago that putting the blame on the DADA teacher was a statistically safe bet.

Albus wasn't sure why Quirrell had taken the stone or how he had circumvented the protections it was behind but he suspected that it was done to assist in the return of Voldemort in some way. Ten years seemed like an appropriate length of time for the old dark lord to return after, especially with how it coincided with the arrival of young Harry at Hogwarts. This brought deep concern to the Headmaster, not in small part because there had been no suspicious activity of any sort after the stone had been takes. No mysterious vanishings, no unexplainable muggle deaths, no unusual activity by the dark lord's old followers, nothing. If Lord Voldemort had indeed returned he was being awfully quiet about it and Albus didn't like that one bit.

Being starved of information left the headmaster unable to adjust his plans, unable to ensure all the pieces on the board would act accordingly. Not being able to see any of your opponent's pieces certainly made a game of chess a lot more interesting.

Annoyed by the lack of information he had to do with the small bit he did have and had already created a list of all methods he could think of that old Tom could use the stone for his resurrection and taken precautions where he could. So had he asked the apothecaries in and around the Alley to keep a watch out for anyone looking to acquire a some of the more specific ingredients needed for the various rituals. But mainly he had started coming up with an increasingly large amount of plans for all the various situations that could arise once Voldemort would come out of the dark, he had preparations in place in case Tom decided to launch a sudden attack on the ministry, had safeties in place for if he had taken over control of the Prophet and was prepared for possible manipulations of the floo powder market. A low buzz coming from a small mirror next to the door brought Albus out of his concentration.

"Come in Severus."

The potions master entered the room, wearing his trademark start-of-year-scowl.

"How were the first days of classes Severus?" the headmaster asked joyfully. Although asking the question was mostly unnecessary, even if he couldn't have guessed the answer from the look on Snape's face, the answer never changed on the years. However Albus thought asking the question each time he was his teachers at the start of the year was an important part of the start of year ceremony.

Snape took a seat on the wide, soft chair in front of the desk and started his annual ritual of complaining about his students.

"As catastrophic as they usually are, the Longbottom boy has managed to achieve the impossible and has become an even bigger danger around a cauldron over the summer. It's a mystery to me why I even have to let disasters like that into my classroom after they've proven unable to complete the simplest task time and time again."

"Now, now, everybody needs to get a chance to study the wonders of magic in all it's forms." Snape responded with a scowl. "Now, has there been any news amongst your fellow colleagues?" Albus continued.

"No unusual activities, everyone has been keeping to themselves like they have been doing over the last years. The most notable thing I have come across is that Malfoy believes his one of the vaults in his home has been compromised over the summer. One of the wards around it was disabled while the family was visiting relatives on the continent. None of the wards around his house had been touched though, only a single ward on the vault was inactive, all the other countless protections around his home were functioning as well as always. I think the malfunctioning ward was simply poorly made, it was barely three years old and the rest have proved themselves countless times over the decades."

"Interesting," the headmaster replied, "interesting, I feel that your view on the situation has plenty of merit, I've heard other stories about how warding services have been sub-par ever since the war ended, it seems that some warders have become lazy in the lack of ever present danger."

"It's unfortunate that people are getting complacent in their apparent safety, especially now that the danger is closer as it has been in over a decade. It's in the times where we feel the safest that we need to be prepared for danger the most." The headmaster finished. Snape, who didn't seemed to impressed by the "wise words" of the headmaster, stood back of and started turning around towards the door "If that's all headmaster, I'll be leaving, the classroom still has burn marks on the ceiling from the Creevey boy's atrocious attempt at a simple boil curring salve."

"Just one more thing Severus, keep an eye out for any unusual activities in your house will you." The headmaster said.

"Really Albus, just because they are Slytherins doesn't mean they're all just waiting for the correct opportunity to start wearing black robes and skeleton masks. If Slytherins were even half as bad as you seem to keep thinking they are there would be weekly muggle offerings in the common room."

With that the potions master walked out of the room, his cloak billowing behind him.


End file.
